Great games that never saw sequels

People always ask, "why is every new video game nowadays a sequel?" That's because we keep buying them. Follow-ups to safe, proven commodities happen so often, it's a downright shocker when they don't. Oftentimes, we get sequels we didn't ask for while games we wish had a follow-up are left solo. Why must the gaming industry deny us awesome sequels to amazing one-shot ideas, while drowning us in Assassin's Creed and Call Of Duty parts two through infinity? Let's look at some excellent games that left us wondering why they never had a sequel.

Shadow of the Colossus

Some ideas are basic enough to work time and again—we're looking at you, Mario and Street Fighter II clones. Others are so unique and innovative they only happen once, with any attempt at a redux quickly dismissed as uninspired and hacky. This would probably be the case with a second Shadow of the Colossus. Notice how nobody has really tried to ape "every stage is a single battle with a gigantic monster," even as just a basic premise? That's because, no matter what they did, it would pale in comparison to the original. As great as it might sound to get a second Colossus, don't expect it to happen (excluding Team Ico's next title, The Last Guardian). And if it does, don't expect it to be anything but a sad rehash of an idea too perfect to ever be successfully duplicated. Either that, or it would abandon the premise entirely, in favor of a more generic action game setup. We're not sure which would be sadder.

The Legend of Dragoon

Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest get "sequels" all the time, in that they're completely different storylines with just enough similarities to justify slapping a new number at the end of each title. But The Legend Of Dragoon, a criminally underrated PlayStation role-playing game, never got the same treatment, and it's honestly baffling as to why. Was it a perfect game? No, but very few new games are ever perfect. Dragoon had more than enough redeeming qualities (gorgeous graphics, a fun-if-basic story, the ability to transform during battle, etc.) to justify giving it a second go. Developers usually get better with each new game. Iron out Dragoon's few flaws (like curbing the number of random battles), and you've got sequel bait for decades.

Conker's Bad Fur Day

Poor, misunderstood Conker has seen two planned sequels (Other Bad Day and Gettin' Medieval) suffer the wrath of the cancel hammer, since Bad Fur Day didn't do too well on store shelves. But Bad Fur Day didn't fail because it sucked. Fur failed because, according to an anonymous Rare designer, Nintendo was simply too squeamish to market a cutesy, yet incredibly profane platformer out of fear that children might mistakenly play it. In today's world, where adorable characters get marketed to adults all the time, a new Conker would almost certainly find an audience. Hopefully whoever takes on this project (somebody will, for we hath decreed it) remembers to keep the humor smart and funny, in addition to rude and crude. That was the big hook for Bad Fur Day—the jokes were certainly obscene, but they were also good, clever jokes. The original was huge on parodies too, so any future Conker should not only include them, but make them real parodies. You know—the kind Hollywood used to make, before studios decided that adding farts to note-for-note scene reshoots was more than enough comedy for them.

Boogerman: A Pick and Flick Adventure

Video games are a serious business, you see. How we've gone 20+ years with only one Boogerman is baffling. No, it wasn't the most clever of games—every punchline was boogers and farts, with belches tossed in for variety—but sometimes, you just want to take a break from epic fantasies and violent gorefests and have a few hours of stupid fun. Boogerman gave you that, and it was surprisingly a good game as well. It was a legit platformer, but its levels were huge, numerous, and let you explore multiple directions, rather than just a plain old left-to-right setup like so many others. You'd think Boogerman 2 would've been an easy layup, right? Clearly not, because nobody's bothered to make one. Do the people just not want it? Judging by a 2013 sequel-funding Kickstarter that looked to raise $375,000 but only managed $40,000, evidently not. While we're not typically ones to judge people's poor decisions, we're doing so here by farting in your general direction in honor of this long-lost video game hero.

Duck Hunt

Duck Hunt isn't just popular because Nintendo kept bundling it with Super Mario Bros. Shooting ducks with a light gun while an annoying dog laughed at your every failure quickly proved to be timeless fun for everyone but the ducks. Despite its success, we never got a Duck Hunt 2. There wasn't any plot to it, but that doesn't mean a Duck Hunt sequel couldn't concoct one. You could make it a 3D, sandbox-style Duck Hunt, where you stalk ducks, deer, and whatever other animal suits your stomach's fancy, and nostalgic fans would love it. Duck Hunt 2 could also fulfill our fantasies by finally letting us shoot at that trolling dog, provided you pay the ASPCA enough to look the other way.

Final Fantasy VI

As the direct (and underwhelming) sequels to Final FantasyVII, X, and XIII have proven, Square Enix is no longer interested in telling a story once and then moving on to something new. Unfortunately, nobody has thought to do the same with Final FantasyVI, a classic that's seemingly been overlooked due to its 3D successors hogging all the glory, but that's still as epic and groundbreaking as any that came after it. In fact, it may have the best story of the series, because it managed to be deep and engrossing without resorting to any needless and confusing plot twists (good luck explaining Cloud's backstory without eating your own tongue). Sure, FFVI's ending wrapped up the story completely, but a little imagination can make anything happen, especially since its world is still ruined from Kefka. Did some creature save the Emperor during his fall from the Floating Continent? Can Kefka be revived? Will some new faction of baddies rise up and attempt to rule a still-destroyed world struggling to rebuild itself? If they can sell us whatever X-2 was supposed to be, they can easily sell us Final Fantasy VI-2.